Old and New Jokes

Q:How do you know when a blonde has been at the computer?

A: There is white out the screen.

The software engineering community has been placing a great deal of
emphasis lately on metrics and their use in software development. The
following metrics are probably among the most valuable for a software
project:

The Pizza Metric

How: Count the number of pizza boxes in the lab.
What: Measures the amount of schedule under-estimation.
If people are spending enough after-hours time
working on the project that they need to have
meals delivered to the office, then there has
obviously been a mis-estimation somewhere.

The Aspirin Metric

How: Maintain a centrally-located aspirin bottle for use
by the team. At the beginning and end of each month,
count the number of aspirin remaining aspirin in the
bottle.
What: Measures stress suffered by the team during the project.
This most likely indicates poor project design in the
early phases, which causes over-expenditure of effort
later on. In the early phases, high aspirin-usage
probably indicates that the products goals or other
parameters were poorly defined.

The Beer Metric

How: Invite the team to a beer bash each Friday. Record the
total bar bill.
What: Closely related to the Aspirin Metric, the Beer Metric
measures the frustration level of the team. Among
other things, this may indicate that the technical
challenge is more difficult than anticipated.

The Creeping Feature Metric

How: Count the number of features added to the project after
the design has been signed off, but that were not requested
by any requirements definition.
What: This measures schedule slack. If the team has time to add
features that are not necessary, then there was too much
time allocated to a schedule task.

The Duck! Metric

How: This one is tricky, but a likely metric would be to
count the number of engineers that leave the room when
a marketing person enters. This is only valid after a
requirements document has been finalized.
What: Measures the completeness of the initial requirements.
If too many requirements changes are made after the product
has been designed, then the engineering team will be wary
of marketing, for fear of receiving yet another change to
a design which met all initial specifications.

The Status Report Metric

How: Count the total number of words dedicated to the project
in each engineers status report.
What: This is a simple way to estimate the smoothness with which
the project is running. If things are going well, an item
will likely read, I talked to Fred; the widgets are on
schedule. If things are not going as well, it will say,
I finally got in touch with Fred after talking to his
phone mail for nine days straight. It appears that the
widgets will be delayed due to snow in the Ozarks, which
will cause the whoozits schedule to be put on hold until
widgets arrive. If the whoozits schedule slips by
three weeks, then the entire project is in danger of
missing the July deadline.

Excerpted from Quotes, damned quotes and… by John Bibby.

Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whatever you say to them they
translate into their own language and forthwith it is something
entirely different. (Goethe)

If there is a 50-50 chance that something can go wrong, then 9
times out of ten it will. (Paul Harvey News, 1979)

Give us a copper Guv, said the beggar to the Treasury
statistician when he waylaid him in Parliament square. I
havent eaten for three days. Ah, said the statistician, And
how does that compare with the same period last year? (Russell
Lewis)

I gather, young man, that you wish to be a Member of
Parliament. The first lesson that you must learn is, when I call
for statistics about the rate of infant mortality, what I want
is proof that fewer babies died when I was Prime Minister than
when anyone else was Prime Minister. That is a political
statistic. (Winston Churchill)

You havent told me yet, said Lady Nuttal, what it is your
fiance does for a living?

Hes a statistician, replied Lamia, with an annoying sense of
being on the defensive.

Lady Nuttal was obviously taken aback. It had not occurred to
her that statisticians entered into normal social relationships.
The species, she would have surmised, was perpetuated in some
collateral manner, like mules.

But Aunt Sara, its a very interesting profession, said Lamia
warmly.

I dont doubt it, said her aunt, who obviously doubted it very
much. To express anything important in mere figures is so
plainly impossible that there must be endless scope for
well-paid advice on how to do it. But dont you think that
life with a statistician would be rather, shall we say,
humdrum?

Lamia was silent. She felt reluctant to discuss the surprising
depth of emotional possibility which she had discovered below
Edwards numerical veneer.

Its not the figures themselves, she said finally. its what
you do with them that matters. (K.A.C. Manderville, The undoing
of Lamia Gurdleneck)

Late one night, a burglar broke into a house that he thought was empty. He tiptoed through the living room but suddenly he froze in his tracks when he heard a loud voice say: Jesus is watching you!

Silence returned to the house, so the burglar crept forward again.

Jesus is watching you, the voice boomed again. The burglar stopped dead again. He was frightened. Frantically, he looked all around.

In a dark corner, he spotted a bird cage and in the cage was a parrot. He asked the parrot: Was that you who said Jesus is watching me?

Yes, said the parrot.

The burglar breathed a sigh of relief, then he asked the parrot: Whats your name?

Clarence, said the bird.

Thats a dumb name for a parrot, sneered the burglar. What idiot named you Clarence?

The parrot replied: The same idiot who named the Rottweiller Jesus.

Q: How do you measure a blondes intelligence?

A: Stick a tire pressure gauge in her ear!

Un día se muere un tipo y se encuentra en el infierno. Mientras tiritaba de desesperación tuvo su primer encuentro con el diablo:

¿Qué te pasa, cabrón?, le cuestiona el diablo.

¿Qué te parece? ¡Estoy en el infierno!

No está tan mal. Actualmente tenemos un montón de diversión aquí. ¿Te gusta beber?

Seguro, amo el alcohol.

Bueno, vas a amar los lunes entonces. Los lunes todo lo que hacemos es beber whisky, tequila, vino… bebemos hasta que reventamos y luego bebemos un poquito más.

Je, je, suena grandioso.

¿Eres fumador?

Más de lo que crees.

¡Perfecto, vas a amar los martes! Conseguimos los cigarros más finos de todo el mundo y fumamos hasta que vomitamos los pulmones. Si te agarras cáncer, no hay problema: ya estás muerto.

¡Guau!

Apuesto a que te gusta el juego.

Sí, en realidad, sí.

Bien, porque los miércoles es el día del juego: ruleta, black jack, carreras de caballos; lo que quieras. Hasta hemos abierto una mesa de strip-poker.

¡Mierda, nunca antes había jugado strip-poker!

Bueno, ahora puedes. ¿Te gustan las drogas?

Sí, amo las drogas. No querrás decir qué…?

¡Exacto! Los jueves es el día de las drogas. Puedes meter tu cabeza en un bol de crack. Fumar un porro del tamaño de un submarino. Puedes hacer lo que quieras con las drogas y si se te va la mano con la dosis, está todo bien: ya estás muerto.

¡Carajo, nunca imaginé que el infierno fuera un lugar con tanta onda!

¿Eres gay?

¡Oh, no!

Uf, vas a odiar los viernes.

Yo mamma so stupid she got hit by a parked car.

Life is what passes you by while youre busy making other plans.

Amsterdam (AP/UPI) — While the Lewinsky scandal continues to rage on the front of American newspapers, a much different reaction has developed on this side of the Atlantic. To world-wise, sophisticated Europeans, the spectacle is a curious sideshow and another reason to mock and disdain the puritan morals of their American counterparts.

You feelthy Americans, you make me seek, says sneering French graduate student Serge Tati, 47, expressing a common sentiment. Fashionably clad in a horizontal stripe t-shirt and skin-tight Speedo, he was recently relaxing on the Lido with his mistress Yvette LaFleur, 43. Like thousands of fellow French graduate students, he was enjoying his annual 28-week vacation.

Beel Clinton, he is Euro, no. He eez moderne, he eez now. He has joie de vivre. He ravages zee young geerls. In my country, we geeve heem a medal, no? asks Tati, deeply drawing on a clove cigarette.

Oui, like Jerry Lewees, adds the topless LaFleur, carefully combing her armpit and leg hair. And yet you treat heem like a common creeminal, noted Tati.

Ptui! You I speet on you, pheelistine American peegs! Wiss your amburgairs and tailfins and your soap! Ha-ha, we laugh at you! he added, shaking his pinched fingers in a Euro-expression of disgust. The interview abruptly ended when a nearby sunbather was angered after being slapped by one of Tatis errant hand gestures. Tati and the subather proceeded to engage in a furious kicking and slapping fight, before fleeing in terror after spotting a German tourist.

At EuroDisney in Fontainbleu, many visitors were likewise perplexed by Americas scandal obsession. Mitterand, he eez to having many affairs, no? We adore heem as a god, explains Jacqueline Robspierre, 28, an adverb specialist at the French Ministry of Language Purity. You puny insignificant Americans, you treat Beel Clinton as eef he were a mere mortal.

Herve Souci agrees. Like thousands of other EuroDisney workers, Souci,39, is on strike demanding government designation as an artiste, which, if granted, will translate into a 47 week annual vacation. Zee American how you say-right-wingair, he eez blind. He cannot see zee simple beauty of Beel Clinton, of zee Jean-Luc Goddard feelm, of zee European football, says Souci, removing the head of his Mickey Mouse costume for a drink of wine. Merde! How I pity and despise you, he adds, pausing to kick two children attempting to cross the picket line.

Across the English Channel and long accustomed to their own lurid sex scandals, Britons appear to find the Lewinsky affair somewhat boring. At the Dog and Queen, a picturesque pub in Londons Mayfair section, a group of locals discusses the scandal over a traditional lunch of boiled sheep pancreas, bitter spleen pie, rancid chocolate and warm beer.

We do have a special relationship with you Yanks, but I must say you have gone a bit starkers over this Lewinsky business, laughs Nigel Ealing, 32, a quality reduction engineer at Jaguar. It positively reminds one of your obsession with plumbing, dentistry and shampoo.

Collin Framinghampton-Smythe, an unemployed soccer hooligan for ManchesterUnited, agreed. Bloody ell, you avent got a single snapshot of er knickers. Shut your bloody gob, ye wee bastard, added his friend Derek Hobson, playfully smashing a pint glass into Framinghampton-Smythes face, dislodging four of his remaining teeth before vomiting on the snooker table.

In Amsterdam, perhaps Europes most cosmopolitan city, the locals openlylaugh at the perceived Puritanism of their American cousins.

Americans, they must have hangups, many many hangups, not like we open-minded Dutch, says leather-hooded, whip-wielding Mistress Dominique, 67, a performer at Amsterdams Elderslutz, a government-operated live sex show featuring senior citizens. The show was created by the Dutch government to provide jobs for unemployed elderly prostitutes.

Bart TenBoek, 42, a government-employed heroin addict, agrees. Bill Clinton is a hero. He is a model of Eurostyle for the backward Americans. No. Wait a minute. He is a tree. A big glowing, pink tree. Flying across the sky making a beautiful, beautiful rainbow, notes TenBoek, laughing uncontrollably as he collapses into a fetal position.

In Milan, where amore is way of life, the citizenry is solidly behind President Clinton. Si, Beel Clinton is multi bello, say Giancarlo Leone, 32, an unemployed movie extra and father of twelve. He is how you say my-a hero. Ciao, bella! Bellisima, Bellisima, he compliments a passing girl, pausing to make smooching sounds as he pinches her hindquarters. Ow! he adds painfully, fleeing on his rusting Vespa to avoid another flowerpot from his wife, who is screaming from a nearby balcony.

In faraway Barcelona, Juan Ortega has similar sentiments. Si, I tink de Americans, dey not like Meester Cleenton too good enough, says Ortega, who had a Coke concession at the 1992 Olympics, but has since been unemployed. Dey should love heem, like we love paella or Generalissimo Franco.

Helga Ericksson, 54, an official with the Swedish Ministry of Furniture and Suicide in Stockholm, agrees. Yah, Americans are fascists. They moostembrace Clinton. Like ve Svedes embrace depression and death.

Germans Dieter Schaden, 28, and Igo Reinholdt, 34, have a message for scandal-obsessed Americans. Ja, get mitten der twentiest century, says the couple, between acts of their bondage and discipline show at a dark Berlin discotheque.

Jane, style editor at the New York Times and a longtime Europhile, feels embarrassment over American scandalmania. All across the continent, they are laughing at our backward, prudish, puritan morals. I almost feel too ashamed to go to there anymore, she says, sipping a cup of black espresso. Kirschner thinks the continentals are on to something.

We have a lot to learn from them. Americans need to become more open-minded and jaded. We need to adopt sophisticated European ways, like $8 per gallon gasoline and 145% tax brackets. The recent election gives Kirschner some hope,though. Apparently, Americans arent as hung up on this scandal as the media thought. Thankfully, we are becoming more like the Europeans.

(Original source unknown.)

You should not attempt these things during an actual exam. The following is meant for entertainment purposes only.

21. Turn in the exam approximately 30 minutes into it. As you walk out, start commenting on how easy it was.